Apple Renews Its Machine Learning Push -- The Motley Fool

Whether you understand it or not -- or, like Elon Musk you even fear it -- artificial intelligence promises to become one of the most important areas of technology in coming years. Though certainly far from creating anything bordering on Skynet, tech giants including Alphabet, Microsoft, Facebook, Amazon, and many others have plowed headlong into the burgeoning field of artificial intelligence. Following suit, tech giant Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) recently demonstrated its own interest in the space by acquiring AI start-up Turi for a reported 200 million. As a number of major publications have noted, Apple purportedly purchased the Seattle-based Turi in early August for an alleged, but unconfirmed, 200 million. When asked about the buyout, Apple predictably responded with the same boilerplate statement it offers for virtually all acquisitions: "Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans."